flywheel
noun
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A heavy wheel attached to a rotating shaft, a flywheel smooths out delivery of power from a motor to a machine. The inertia of the flywheel moderates fluctuations in the speed of the engine and stores the excess energy for intermittent use. In automobile engines, the flywheel smooths out the pulses of energy provided by combustion in the cylinders, and provides energy for the compression stroke of the pistons. In power presses, the punching, shearing, and forming are done in a fraction of the operating cycle. During the rest of the cycle, the speed of the flywheel is built up by a comparatively low-powered motor, and most of the required energy for the cycle is provided by the flywheel.
Examples of flywheel in a Sentence
Trevor Clawson, Forbes.com, 26 Mar. 2025
This flywheel is then accelerated even further since Austin is now home to some of the world’s leading investors, like Jim Breyer, the legendary VC who has been on the boards of Dell, Etsy, Facebook, Marvel, Spotify, Wal-Mart, and 21st Century Fox.
—Amir Husain, Forbes, 22 Mar. 2025
The flywheel could reverse: Musk could become universally reviled, causing the protests to increase and his net worth to shrink.
—Charlie Warzel, The Atlantic, 12 Mar. 2025
Jain describes Bilt’s model as having a flywheel effect.
—Luisa Kroll, Forbes, 17 Mar. 2025
See All Example Sentences for flywheel
Cite this Entry
“Flywheel.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/flywheel. Accessed 7 Apr. 2025.
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